


Save Yourself

by scribbleb_red



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Hurt No Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-20
Updated: 2019-07-20
Packaged: 2020-07-09 13:10:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,106
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19888366
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scribbleb_red/pseuds/scribbleb_red
Summary: (aka: the four times Riko Moriyama protected Kevin Day and the one time he didn’t)'When Kevin Day is led into the Master’s private dining quarters, Riko is already kneeling on the tatami mat at his place by the low table. His knees hurt. He’s been waiting for nearly an hour in the same position, hands folded behind his back, resting on his heels.“Kevin," says the Master, "This is your new brother, Riko Moriyama.”'POV Riko Moriyama





	Save Yourself

**Author's Note:**

> Because this thread happened on twitter and I had to write the story to go with it.  
> https://twitter.com/itsrikotime/status/1152602432775577600
> 
> Here is the song to go with it too. https://open.spotify.com/track/2AwPXDmMeUJGt2Ro5Ea10G?si=cCh5LyW6Tl6eoqsCoyDtqw

**Save Yourself**

**(aka: the four times Riko Moriyama knew he had to protect Kevin Day and the one time he didn’t)**

_Are you going to break?_  
Are you going to break?  
Are you going to break?

_\- Kaleo_

**(1)**

**I am my brother’s keeper**

When Kevin Day is led into the Master’s private dining quarters, Riko is already kneeling on the tatami mat at his place by the low table. His knees hurt. He’s been waiting for nearly an hour in the same position, hands folded behind his back, resting on his heels.

“Kevin, this is your new brother, Riko Moriyama,” Tetsuji-sensei says. “Sit.”

Kevin doesn’t look up, he’s red-eyed and hollowed out, paler than anyone Riko has ever seen and small too. When he doesn’t immediately react to the Master’s orders, Riko stiffens in concern. He knows what happens when you don’t obey fast enough, and his skin stings in sympathetic expectation.

But the Master doesn’t raise his cane. He simply guides the newcomer to the table and pushes him down beside Riko. He doesn’t kneel, he sits, crossing his legs and slouching like he doesn’t have enough spine to hold himself upright.

Riko’s whole body is tense. His lower back hurts from holding the same position for so long. His knees feel gnarled and knotted as the tatami.

“Riko-kun,” the Master says in Japanese. “Kevin will be your responsibility.”

Swallowing, Riko bows his head to the table. This is an order, a mandate. “Hai, sensei-sama.”

“Kevin’s success will reflect on yours. Yours will reflect on him. From now on, you and Kevin are a unit. Do you understand?”

Yes, Riko understands. If Riko doesn’t teach Kevin everything he needs to know, things will go very, very badly for both of them – he doesn’t want to think about the number of lashes he took yesterday for missing five cones in a row, but he knows that’s what his uncle is telling him. If Kevin fails, it’ll mean more of the cane. He slides his eyes over to the boy at his side, apparently oblivious to the conversation happening around him in Japanese. He’s pretty, kind of elfin with cheekbones from a picture book, and he looks so sad.

But that’s okay, Riko thinks. Kevin is his brother. Kevin is his. He won’t let anything bad happen to him. Not ever.

**(2)**

**All the decisive blows are struck left-handed**

Kevin is meant to be the smart one, and Riko doesn’t mind at all.

Except for during their lessons in Japanese. Riko has grown up with it all his life, learning the language, the etiquette, the calligraphy. He’s not bad at it, though he’ll never be good enough for his uncle.

Kevin, however, is left handed. And this is unacceptable to the Master.

Riko’s tried everything he can think of – making it a competition, kicking Kevin’s chair whenever he picks up a pen with the wrong hand, refusing to speak to him if he doesn’t do well enough on the assignments. He even tried helping but that just prickled Kevin’s pride. Kevin is smart. He likes books, devouring them faster than Riko can eat a mochi cake on his birthday. In tutorials, he likes being the top of their class of two and Riko’s happy to let him be.

But writing left handed has meant more bruises across their knuckles than Riko thinks hands are meant to withstand. He looks at his fingers, they’re still mottled yellow from the week before, and he knows they’ll be black and blue before the afternoon is done unless Kevin does better with his letters.

The problem is Kevin’s handwriting slopes in different directions left to right and there’s nothing he’s tried so far that disguises it.

Taking a look at the door to their classroom, Riko quickly stands and pads his way over to Kevin’s desk.

“If you’re going to kick me, I’m going to kick you back,” Kevin says through gritted teeth.

“Give me your work,” Riko replies.

Kevin pauses and looks up at Riko. His eyes are big and green, dark hair flopping into his eyes – Riko makes a note that he’ll have to cut it soon, before the Master decides to buzzcut them both again. “What?” Kevin asks. “Why?”

“Just do what I say, Kev,” Riko says. They haven’t got a lot of time and he wants this done as fast as possible. But Kevin doesn’t seem to understand. Looks at him so blankly, Riko relents. _And Kevin was supposed to be the smart one._ “We have a League game tomorrow,” he says (so what if it’s Little Leagues, he knows what the Master thinks of their failures). “Give me your work or neither of us will have working hands to play with.”

Kevin’s face shutters. He’s all pride and the desperate desire to be _good_ , but Kevin also knows that Riko speaks the truth.

Shuffling to one side of his seat, Kevin makes space for Riko to perch on the chair. Riko takes the pen. Their thighs are pressed together, their bony knees knocking.

Riko knows Kevin can pass any of their other classes with his eyes closed – he knows that when it comes to speaking Japanese, Kevin is just as good as he is. But in this instance, Riko is the one who can help and he does.

He doesn’t want to see another mark on Kevin’s skin. Not ever.

**(3)**

**The history of Kevin Day’s obsession with history**

Riko lies in the dark, covered in more bruises than he knows how to count. He’s aching and tired and his eyes sting where he’s holding back tears. He’s so angry. So angry at Kevin. He wants to hit him, make him feel this pain _because it should be his_. This is Kevin’s fault for not doing as he was told by the Master, for not scoring when it was _so simple_. That was all they had to do.

Riko squeezes his eyes shut and it feels like there’s a stone in his throat, one big enough to choke him and draws in a rattling breath.

“Riko?” Kevin’s voice travels through the dark of their room. “Are you awake?”

Riko can’t speak. He’s biting his lip too hard to open his mouth. But he nods, knows that Kevin will hear the rustle of his head against the pillow.

“Are you okay?”

_No. No, he’s not okay_. And he’s not sure he ever has been.

“Do you want me to tell you about the Prince of Poyais?”

Riko’s lungs shudder, sending a sting through his ribs. Anything to distract him from this would be a blessing and he nods again.

“Okay…” Kevin rolls in his bed, and Riko knows he’s facing him across the room. “Well everyone likes a great con artist story but this one just so happens to be true. This is the real history of Scottish imposter, Gregor McGregor, who managed to convince the Queen of England that he was the Prince of a fictional country in South America…”

As Kevin talks, Riko finds himself relaxing. This is familiar. This is safe.

In the last four years together, he and Kevin played more games, saw more blood, and took more beatings than most people saw stars in the sky. And since there was no such thing as fairytales or fables in the Master’s kingdom of Evermore – two things Kevin said his mother gave to him as a child – Kevin had declared _history_ their version of a bedtime story.

So from school books and extra texts nicked from the Evermore libraries, Kevin wove together stories of the Celts and the Romans, the Tudors and the Native Americas. He told Riko about how the Mongols fought the Samurai in Japan at the same time as the knights of Europe and how Edgar Allen Poe and Abraham Lincoln were friends and how woolly mammoths still roams the earth when the ancient pyramids were being built.

Riko likes Kevin’s version of history. It’s all passion and stories – there’s so much colour in the characters but they’re not just acts of imagination, they’re full of tiny and true details taken from old primary sources like diaries and newspapers. To Kevin, Napolean wasn’t just an old Corsican but a fully dimensional man – growing from an outcast child to a strategic and logical leader. All of Kevin’s favourite heroes are like that: intelligent men, smart men, men who love books and theory and only put it into action because they’re driven to by some huge societal need like war or revolution.

Riko figures that’s the kind of man Kevin would be if he didn’t play exy: all theory, all study, only acting from necessity.

Lying in the dark, Riko’s chest begins to loosen. He stops chewing his lower lip. He never understood Kevin’s love of history, but he understood the need to find a way out of the dark. And sometimes he was glad Kevin would weave stories like this, his own personal Scheharezade, helping him think beyond the walls of Evermore.

It made the sting of his beating a little easier. It made loving his brother after suffering for his failure to score more than twice a little easier too.

“I’m sorry, Riko,” Kevin says when his story for the night is finished.

“Tomorrow, let’s score four,” Riko says. His voice is hoarse. “And the day after, let’s score six.”

“Let’s score eight. We’re going to be the best exy players the world’s ever seen.”

“Yeah,” Riko says but he feels cold, wonders what would happen if he really surpassed the Master. “They’ll fill your history books with us one day.”

Kevin’s chuckle is small and fragile and beautiful. “Because we’ll be legends. The perfect court.”

“Yeah,” Riko echoes. “The Perfect Court.”

Because even when he’s angry, Riko never wants Kevin to stop believing a story can fix everything. Not ever.

**(4)**

**In the face of pain there are no heroes**

Riko sneers at the new kid – Jean Moreau, soon-to-be starting backliner for the Ravens, most recent acquisition to the Master’s Perfect Court. No: _his_ Perfect Court.

Kevin shifts at his side. He’s become quieter lately, more serious and studious, taking on more responsibility as the Master demands longer hours and harder sessions of them – it’s expected though from the future Captain and Vice-Captain of the Ravens.

There’s a new light in Kevin’s cedar green eyes when he looks at Moreau and Riko hates it. Hates it because he knows Kevin is already thinking about how practicing with a defender will make them even better, even stronger, and that is going to mess with their dynamic. Riko and Kevin have always been a two. They’ve practiced with strangers, they’ve been handed over to the Raven captains and all but destroyed over and over on the Evermore court. But to have Moreau here – someone new, someone permanent – that changes everything. That turns two into three.

Riko does not like the idea of a three.

Especially after the Master tells them all that Moreau is Kevin’s responsibility.

Riko knows what that means.

Moreau is not just a nuisance, he’s a liability. His incompetence will reflect on Kevin. Kevin will be punished when Moreau fails, which he inevitably will. And Riko won’t be able to do anything to stop it. He might even be asked to take part in the punishment. He think of the Master’s knifes and feels a small thrill at the idea of seeing Moreau bleed.

Staring deliberately into the space behind Moreau’s head, however, Riko feels the familiar flames of his hatred towards Kevin – the fury and frustration – because Kevin is being stupid and he doesn’t even know it.

Fortunately, Moreau will never be Riko’s brother. He owes him nothing. He owes him less than nothing. And if he gets Kevin hurt, he’ll beat him until he knows better. He’ll cut Jean like the Master cut them. He’ll hold him down until he knew his place: at their feet and at their command.

Jean has a spiteful look to him, a defiant chin and fire in his eyes. Those will have to go. Fast.

Riko never wants Kevin to risk himself outside of the game. Never wants him to jeopardise his life to help grow someone as insignificant as Jean Moreau. But Riko knows he will because Kevin, for all that he’s smart, will see this is as a chance to get _better_ , to know and learn more about exy, about the game they both chase like it’s meaning of life.

Riko’s stomach burned with future. He never wants Kevin to be close to another person when it’ll only get him hurt. Not ever.

**(5)**

**Thus spake the raven, nevermore**

“You found what?”

“A letter. From my mom. About… about my real father.” Kevin’s voice is choked and he stumbles over his words, barely more clear than the last time he tried to explain to Riko what’s going on in that thick skull of his.

Ire rising, Riko lets his racquet clatter down against the changing room floor. He knows if he’s holding it, he’ll smash it into Kevin’s stupid face. “And what about it? You want to go meet him? The man who clearly abandoned your mother?”

“She says she never told him. That she never mentioned me to him.” Kevin is pale and trembling, washed out. He looks like the Ghost of Christmas Past, echoes showing of the child led into the Master’s quarters on a rainy October afternoon so long ago. “He’s an exy coach. The Palmetto Foxes.”

Riko snorts. “The worst team in Class I? They’ll be relegated next year, just wait and see.”

“I could visit him.” Kevin twirls his stick in his hand, keeping the ball in the net by sheer speed of spin.

It’s their first year captaining the Ravens and they’re not good enough yet for the Master to trust them on team exercises alone. They’ve just finished a face-off, in which Kevin won and they’re finally allowed to sleep, though Riko knows he’ll lie awake in shame until morning when the Master will collect him for whatever punishment he sees fit. It’s not Riko’s fault that he’s not in the mood for the emotional breakdown Kevin seems determined to have. Kevin has done all of this to them both.

“Do you ever wonder what we’d be if we weren’t here?” Kevin’s question is a knife cutting through carefully stitched skin.

“No,” Riko says because it’s the truth.

The Master had told them enough times, had proven enough times, that they were nothing without Evermore. Exy and Evermore and US Court. Those made up the spine of their identity. They were the tattoos on their faces, once drawn over and over in permanent marker because _this was who they were:_ the right hand and the left hand, the first and second sons of exy.

“But what if we went somewhere else?” Kevin insists.

“What? Like _Palmetto?_ ”

“Why not? Just think who we could be. We could be even better than we are now. We could build something from scratch. We could—”

Riko sneers. “We are building something. We’re building our Perfect Court.”

“But they have talent. They have Minyard.”

“The trash heap goalie with a psychosis diagnosis? You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”

But despite his sneering, Riko’s heart is going a thousand miles an hour, fuelled by the self-hate and the anger. If he lets himself think it, Riko knows if he ever loses Kevin – a soul that is just a little bit brighter, a little bit less corrupted than his own – then he will never recover. Kevin is half of who he is. He’s his second. His stronger hand. His friend. His biggest vulnerability. No matter how often the Master beat them, Kevin was his brother. Does he hate Kevin? Yes. Does he need Kevin? Of course, he does. Because the idea of living without him is absurd. Riko would burn the world for Kevin. Which is why Riko is so sure that Kevin is not going to leave him. Not for some shitty team in Carolina with a second-rate coach that would never help him be the best. Only the Master could give them that status. Only the Ravens could deliver their dream: their Perfect Court.

They are meant to be in it together. Brothers to the end. Hating and needing and fighting alongside each other, protecting each other. Yet the first sign of a way out and Kevin is – _what?_ – thinking about jumping ship? Riko’s chest feels tight and hot and full of coal. 

Then again, is it so strange? Kevin has always been looking for an escape – through stories whispered in the dark, through bloody responsibilities shirked onto Riko, through second languages taught by Jean. Riko has never had another option. He was born and left at Evermore. He was raised and told to be the best exy player in the world. His choices were always these: live and serve his family, or face down the barrel of a gun. 

_Strive. Succeed. Survive._ The rules were so simple.

“I’m not kidding,” says Kevin. “We’re good, the best. But we can be better.”

“We are nothing without the Ravens.” Riko feels like a broken record, playing over the words they’ve heard for years and years. He doesn’t know why Kevin doesn’t carry them in his bones like he does.

“Maybe you are,” Kevin retorts. “But I’m not. You heard Tetsuji this morning. The ERC think I’m good. Really good. Better than you.”

Riko doesn’t remember raising his fist but he feels the pain in his hand as it collides with Kevin’s cheek and he’ll never forgot the red splatter of blood bursting from Kevin’s aquiline nose or the shock in those green-grey eyes. It’s by no means the first time they’ve fought but it’s as if even Kevin knows he’s crossed a line by bringing up the ERC.

He doesn’t remember what Kevin says either, not when he tries to push Riko away, tries to ward him off. He thinks it might have been apologies. Might have been pleas for him to stop.

He doesn’t stop. He’s seeing red as he brings his foot down hard, fast, again and again and again and again against Kevin’s left hand, splayed on the floor of the changing room.

When he’s done, Kevin’s hand is a shattered, mangled thing and likewise, behind his ribcage, Riko’s heart is broken to match.

Riko knows when he storms away, when he sends Moreau to clear up the sobbing mess he’s made of Kevin Day, that he will never be whole again.

Not ever.

**Author's Note:**

> Thoughts? Feels? Hit me!


End file.
